"An Ocean Breeze" by BonnieD PG
Hiatus assignment: Seth/Summer confrontation on board his boat, for ElStallion. All disclaimers apply.
The air was still and almost too thick and moist to breathe, like being in a tropical jungle but without the trees. Not a breeze stirred the surface of the ocean. It was almost as calm and flat as a lake. Seth thought that if he was still on his way to Tahiti, he'd be going nowhere on a day like today with no wind to fill his sails.
Going nowhere. Well, that about summed up his life now didn't it?
Here it was, another July, and despite the wild adventures and supposed changes that had occurred in his life during the past year, Seth was right back where he'd always been – alone on the Summer Breeze. He shouldn't complain. He was lucky he was even allowed to keep the catamaran. Mom had been ready to make sure he never set foot on any water-borne vessel the rest of his life but Dad had run interference and Seth was allowed to keep his beloved boat.
Seth still stung at the remembered humiliation of being rescued by the Coast Guard his second day out. He had been caught, unprepared, in a huge storm and had to radio for help when he realized he wasn't going to be able to ride through this one. The worst part was that deep inside he was grateful to be intercepted. He was already sorry for his impulsive flight even before the storm forced his return.
Now, after six weeks of house arrest and total isolation, Seth was back on board the boat, checking her over for storm damage and generally puttering about.
"Hey." The soft voice behind him made Seth start and drop the rope he was coiling. He turned to see Summer standing on the dock. She was so beautiful in her pale lilac sundress with her dark hair gleaming in the sun that Seth's breath caught in his throat. Her arms were folded across her chest and she shifted from one foot to the other as he continued to stare at her, speechless.
"Well, aren't you going to invite me aboard?" she asked impatiently when the silence had drawn out to an awkward length. "Isn't that like protocol or something?"
Seth picked his jaw up off the floor and made words. "Uh, yeah. I'm sorry. I guess I thought I was hallucinating there for a second but you're really here." He extended a hand and Summer touched it briefly, letting go immediately after stepping onto the deck.
"I'm here," she assured him. "I don't know WHY I'm here but I'm here."
"About that ... I'm really sorry. The whole escape to Tahiti adventure was kind of a disaster and a really dumb idea and leaving a note like that was...."
"Irresponsible? Stupid? Cruel? Hurtful? Idiotic? Heartless?" Summer enumerated in staccato succession. She drew a breath, "Childish? Melodramatic? Asinine?"
"Yeah. All of the above." Unable to stand her penetrating brown eyes, Seth crouched and began examining a knot that had absolutely nothing wrong with it. He began to untie it simply to have something to do with his hands.
Another of those silences dragged out, long and sticky as a taffy pull.
Summer sighed and her hands went to her hips, never a good sign. "Look! I'm here, Cohen. Talk to me. This is your big chance – maybe your only chance. I want some explanations and I want them now. Why'd you really do it? And why haven't you called me since you got back? Oh, I know you were grounded, your mom told me that, but if you really wanted to talk to me you would've found a way. What the hell is happening between us?"
She gathered force and momentum. "You promised me! You said in front of the whole school that you liked me and you promised that you wouldn't get bored and dump me. But a month later, what happens? You take off on some stupid sailing trip and leave me a n-note!" Her voice broke.
Seth wanted to leap to his feet and take her in his arms. Of course he did. A gorgeous, teary-eyed girl practically professing her love for him, why wouldn't he want to hold and comfort her? Why couldn't he? Why was he still mucking around with the stupid rope knot and refusing to look up at her, let alone stand up and grab her?
"Seth?"
He continued to pick at the stubborn hemp, which was welded together by time and salt spray. He couldn't unfasten it.
"I'm sorry," he muttered. "I already said that. And I'm sorry I didn't call you but I couldn't, okay?"
"I'm hearing an apology but I'm not feeling it," Summer said, her voice firmly back under control. She dropped to her knees beside him. "Please! Talk to me."
"What else do you want me to say?" he asked, and his voice sounded snotty and petulant even to his own ears.
"I know this has something to do with Ryan, " Summer pressed on. "You felt, like, betrayed or something because he left. But, Seth, what about me? I told you the day you left that you still had me. Didn't that mean anything to you?"
The knot finally began to loosen in Seth's hands and he carefully disentangled the rope.
"Of course it meant something ... means something to me." He sighed. "I still like you, Summer. Still love you even, but Ryan leaving reminded me of some things I thought I'd gotten over but ... maybe I haven't. Or maybe I never will."
"Like what?" Summer sounded genuinely curious.
Seth finally looked in her eyes. "Like the fact that there would've been no 'us' if it hadn't been for Ryan. Like the fact that I never would've made it under your radar if Ryan and Marissa hadn't hooked up. You and me getting together was kind of this bizarre anomaly based on random coincidences, and never would've happened in the natural order of things. You never would have even looked at me, let alone spoken to me, if life hadn't been thrown out of whack by Ryan showing up."
"So?" Summer was bemused. "So it was like a miracle, right? We were really lucky circumstances changed and we found each other. That's a good thing. What's the problem?"
"The problem is..." Seth exploded, "...why did 'circumstances have to change'? Why couldn't you see me as a person before? I guess it just bothers me that if Ryan hadn't come to Newport things would be the same now as they always were – status quo. You'd still be a snobby princess and I'd still be something you'd scrape off your shoe."
Summer nodded slowly, biting her bottom lip. "I get that. And maybe you're right," she told him, picking up the rope and running her hand over the rough surface. "But Seth, Ryan did come ... and things did change. I've changed. I'm not that girl; the one who partied too hard and walked all over people, and you're not the same person either."
Seth abandoned all pretense of tying the rope and sat back on his heels. "How do I know things won't change again?"
"They will, of course! People say 'Life is change' for a reason. But you don't have to assume it will be for the worse," Summer argued. She put a beseeching hand on his arm and looked at him with all the earnestness her deep brown eyes could muster, which was considerable.
Seth melted under her gaze. He smiled slightly. "How'd you get to be so wise, Summer? You're almost as good as Anna."
"Watch it! You're already on my bad side," she teased, and then she struck a little attitudinal pose, thrusting out her jaw. "I'll tell you one thing, Cohen, if you don't stop shutting me out things WILL get worse. I'll forgive you once for treating me like shit because I know you're only a dumb boy and your head is all screwed up, but if you EVER do me like this again...."
"You'll dump me like last year's fashions. Got it." Seth completed. He gave her his best begging-dog face. "Forgive me?"
"I will, but not because you deserve it. You don't. Fortunately for you I'm a very generous person and besides, I worked way too hard on this relationship to give up so easily."
"Can we kiss and make up now?" he asked.
"That's why I'm here," she replied.
Seth rose to his knees and Summer leaned forward to meet him. She pushed a hand into the matt of curly hair at the nape of his neck and pulled him toward her. Seth closed his eyes as their lips met. All of his sense memories were reawakened by the kiss. Her lips were as soft, pliant and cherry-glossed as always and he wondered just what the hell he had been so upset about only moments before. Something about attitudes and abandonment and atonement, what the hell had he been thinking? Who cared if Summer used to ignore him? She wasn't ignoring him now.
He wrapped his arm around her waist, grappling their upper bodies together. The day was really too hot and humid for groping. Their skin quickly fused together in a kind of sticky sheen of sweat but that was fine by Seth. Summer didn't seem to mind either; she ran her hand up his back under his T-shirt, scraping lightly with her nails all the way up his spine. Seth shivered in spite of the heat.
Summer planted one last tongue-lunging, mouth-scorching kiss on him then pulled back. Seth's eyes opened to find her looking at him with a smug smile on her face. "Better?" she asked.
"Summer, you're the queen of understatement," he replied. "Next time I act like an ass you can skip straight past the scolding part and go right to this. It yields much better results."
"There's just one more thing I want to say and then we're done talking about all this emotional crap," she said, turning serious. "The way you believe that Ryan changed you, made you more confident, stronger, happier or whatever? Well, that's what you did for me, Seth. You made me, like, a better version of myself or something." She gave an embarrassed little shrug. "I just thought you should know that."
Seth was beyond words, which was saying a lot for Sandy Cohen's son.
Summer sniffed and tossed back her hair. "That's it. It's all you're getting from me so suck it up while you can."
Seth grabbed his girl and hugged her close, thanking whatever god looked after Jewish Christian boys that Summer had miraculously fallen in love with him.
Just then a light breeze sprang up, ruffling their hair and suffusing the air with the salty tang of seawater.
"Mm, that feels good," she murmured, resting her chin on Seth's shoulder. He wasn't sure if she was talking about the fresh zephyr or his hand rubbing slowly up and down her back, so he kept on doing that.
"Hey, Summer," he said.
"Yeah?"
"I never took you sailing yet. Do you like to sail?"
"Sure."
"There's enough wind now. You want to go?"
"If you promise not to kidnap me and take me to Tahiti."
"No. Just Catalina," Seth promised. He pulled away from her and gave her another, long, slow kiss. "Are you ready to be my first mate?" he asked. "You have to take directions without question and snap to it when I tell you to."
"In that case, I don't know about this whole sailing thing," she prevaricated.
"Don't worry. You'll catch on. Let's practice. I say 'kiss me' and you...?"
Summer demonstrated her willingness to be a first mate after all.
The wind rose as the couple separated and prepared to set sail. Seth untied the boat from its mooring and cast off. The sails swelled as they swept away from shore and headed out of the bay under the power of a lively ocean breeze.
The End
Hiatus assignment: Seth/Summer confrontation on board his boat, for ElStallion. All disclaimers apply.
The air was still and almost too thick and moist to breathe, like being in a tropical jungle but without the trees. Not a breeze stirred the surface of the ocean. It was almost as calm and flat as a lake. Seth thought that if he was still on his way to Tahiti, he'd be going nowhere on a day like today with no wind to fill his sails.
Going nowhere. Well, that about summed up his life now didn't it?
Here it was, another July, and despite the wild adventures and supposed changes that had occurred in his life during the past year, Seth was right back where he'd always been – alone on the Summer Breeze. He shouldn't complain. He was lucky he was even allowed to keep the catamaran. Mom had been ready to make sure he never set foot on any water-borne vessel the rest of his life but Dad had run interference and Seth was allowed to keep his beloved boat.
Seth still stung at the remembered humiliation of being rescued by the Coast Guard his second day out. He had been caught, unprepared, in a huge storm and had to radio for help when he realized he wasn't going to be able to ride through this one. The worst part was that deep inside he was grateful to be intercepted. He was already sorry for his impulsive flight even before the storm forced his return.
Now, after six weeks of house arrest and total isolation, Seth was back on board the boat, checking her over for storm damage and generally puttering about.
"Hey." The soft voice behind him made Seth start and drop the rope he was coiling. He turned to see Summer standing on the dock. She was so beautiful in her pale lilac sundress with her dark hair gleaming in the sun that Seth's breath caught in his throat. Her arms were folded across her chest and she shifted from one foot to the other as he continued to stare at her, speechless.
"Well, aren't you going to invite me aboard?" she asked impatiently when the silence had drawn out to an awkward length. "Isn't that like protocol or something?"
Seth picked his jaw up off the floor and made words. "Uh, yeah. I'm sorry. I guess I thought I was hallucinating there for a second but you're really here." He extended a hand and Summer touched it briefly, letting go immediately after stepping onto the deck.
"I'm here," she assured him. "I don't know WHY I'm here but I'm here."
"About that ... I'm really sorry. The whole escape to Tahiti adventure was kind of a disaster and a really dumb idea and leaving a note like that was...."
"Irresponsible? Stupid? Cruel? Hurtful? Idiotic? Heartless?" Summer enumerated in staccato succession. She drew a breath, "Childish? Melodramatic? Asinine?"
"Yeah. All of the above." Unable to stand her penetrating brown eyes, Seth crouched and began examining a knot that had absolutely nothing wrong with it. He began to untie it simply to have something to do with his hands.
Another of those silences dragged out, long and sticky as a taffy pull.
Summer sighed and her hands went to her hips, never a good sign. "Look! I'm here, Cohen. Talk to me. This is your big chance – maybe your only chance. I want some explanations and I want them now. Why'd you really do it? And why haven't you called me since you got back? Oh, I know you were grounded, your mom told me that, but if you really wanted to talk to me you would've found a way. What the hell is happening between us?"
She gathered force and momentum. "You promised me! You said in front of the whole school that you liked me and you promised that you wouldn't get bored and dump me. But a month later, what happens? You take off on some stupid sailing trip and leave me a n-note!" Her voice broke.
Seth wanted to leap to his feet and take her in his arms. Of course he did. A gorgeous, teary-eyed girl practically professing her love for him, why wouldn't he want to hold and comfort her? Why couldn't he? Why was he still mucking around with the stupid rope knot and refusing to look up at her, let alone stand up and grab her?
"Seth?"
He continued to pick at the stubborn hemp, which was welded together by time and salt spray. He couldn't unfasten it.
"I'm sorry," he muttered. "I already said that. And I'm sorry I didn't call you but I couldn't, okay?"
"I'm hearing an apology but I'm not feeling it," Summer said, her voice firmly back under control. She dropped to her knees beside him. "Please! Talk to me."
"What else do you want me to say?" he asked, and his voice sounded snotty and petulant even to his own ears.
"I know this has something to do with Ryan, " Summer pressed on. "You felt, like, betrayed or something because he left. But, Seth, what about me? I told you the day you left that you still had me. Didn't that mean anything to you?"
The knot finally began to loosen in Seth's hands and he carefully disentangled the rope.
"Of course it meant something ... means something to me." He sighed. "I still like you, Summer. Still love you even, but Ryan leaving reminded me of some things I thought I'd gotten over but ... maybe I haven't. Or maybe I never will."
"Like what?" Summer sounded genuinely curious.
Seth finally looked in her eyes. "Like the fact that there would've been no 'us' if it hadn't been for Ryan. Like the fact that I never would've made it under your radar if Ryan and Marissa hadn't hooked up. You and me getting together was kind of this bizarre anomaly based on random coincidences, and never would've happened in the natural order of things. You never would have even looked at me, let alone spoken to me, if life hadn't been thrown out of whack by Ryan showing up."
"So?" Summer was bemused. "So it was like a miracle, right? We were really lucky circumstances changed and we found each other. That's a good thing. What's the problem?"
"The problem is..." Seth exploded, "...why did 'circumstances have to change'? Why couldn't you see me as a person before? I guess it just bothers me that if Ryan hadn't come to Newport things would be the same now as they always were – status quo. You'd still be a snobby princess and I'd still be something you'd scrape off your shoe."
Summer nodded slowly, biting her bottom lip. "I get that. And maybe you're right," she told him, picking up the rope and running her hand over the rough surface. "But Seth, Ryan did come ... and things did change. I've changed. I'm not that girl; the one who partied too hard and walked all over people, and you're not the same person either."
Seth abandoned all pretense of tying the rope and sat back on his heels. "How do I know things won't change again?"
"They will, of course! People say 'Life is change' for a reason. But you don't have to assume it will be for the worse," Summer argued. She put a beseeching hand on his arm and looked at him with all the earnestness her deep brown eyes could muster, which was considerable.
Seth melted under her gaze. He smiled slightly. "How'd you get to be so wise, Summer? You're almost as good as Anna."
"Watch it! You're already on my bad side," she teased, and then she struck a little attitudinal pose, thrusting out her jaw. "I'll tell you one thing, Cohen, if you don't stop shutting me out things WILL get worse. I'll forgive you once for treating me like shit because I know you're only a dumb boy and your head is all screwed up, but if you EVER do me like this again...."
"You'll dump me like last year's fashions. Got it." Seth completed. He gave her his best begging-dog face. "Forgive me?"
"I will, but not because you deserve it. You don't. Fortunately for you I'm a very generous person and besides, I worked way too hard on this relationship to give up so easily."
"Can we kiss and make up now?" he asked.
"That's why I'm here," she replied.
Seth rose to his knees and Summer leaned forward to meet him. She pushed a hand into the matt of curly hair at the nape of his neck and pulled him toward her. Seth closed his eyes as their lips met. All of his sense memories were reawakened by the kiss. Her lips were as soft, pliant and cherry-glossed as always and he wondered just what the hell he had been so upset about only moments before. Something about attitudes and abandonment and atonement, what the hell had he been thinking? Who cared if Summer used to ignore him? She wasn't ignoring him now.
He wrapped his arm around her waist, grappling their upper bodies together. The day was really too hot and humid for groping. Their skin quickly fused together in a kind of sticky sheen of sweat but that was fine by Seth. Summer didn't seem to mind either; she ran her hand up his back under his T-shirt, scraping lightly with her nails all the way up his spine. Seth shivered in spite of the heat.
Summer planted one last tongue-lunging, mouth-scorching kiss on him then pulled back. Seth's eyes opened to find her looking at him with a smug smile on her face. "Better?" she asked.
"Summer, you're the queen of understatement," he replied. "Next time I act like an ass you can skip straight past the scolding part and go right to this. It yields much better results."
"There's just one more thing I want to say and then we're done talking about all this emotional crap," she said, turning serious. "The way you believe that Ryan changed you, made you more confident, stronger, happier or whatever? Well, that's what you did for me, Seth. You made me, like, a better version of myself or something." She gave an embarrassed little shrug. "I just thought you should know that."
Seth was beyond words, which was saying a lot for Sandy Cohen's son.
Summer sniffed and tossed back her hair. "That's it. It's all you're getting from me so suck it up while you can."
Seth grabbed his girl and hugged her close, thanking whatever god looked after Jewish Christian boys that Summer had miraculously fallen in love with him.
Just then a light breeze sprang up, ruffling their hair and suffusing the air with the salty tang of seawater.
"Mm, that feels good," she murmured, resting her chin on Seth's shoulder. He wasn't sure if she was talking about the fresh zephyr or his hand rubbing slowly up and down her back, so he kept on doing that.
"Hey, Summer," he said.
"Yeah?"
"I never took you sailing yet. Do you like to sail?"
"Sure."
"There's enough wind now. You want to go?"
"If you promise not to kidnap me and take me to Tahiti."
"No. Just Catalina," Seth promised. He pulled away from her and gave her another, long, slow kiss. "Are you ready to be my first mate?" he asked. "You have to take directions without question and snap to it when I tell you to."
"In that case, I don't know about this whole sailing thing," she prevaricated.
"Don't worry. You'll catch on. Let's practice. I say 'kiss me' and you...?"
Summer demonstrated her willingness to be a first mate after all.
The wind rose as the couple separated and prepared to set sail. Seth untied the boat from its mooring and cast off. The sails swelled as they swept away from shore and headed out of the bay under the power of a lively ocean breeze.
The End